On the way back from Tam Tam park today I stumbled upon this little gem. You might not think anything is interesting about this picture, but then I would say you don’t have a keen eye. Being that Montreal is in Quebec (a French speaking Province), all Official texts are in French, so it’s Rue Université. Ok so what you might ask? Well I’ve seen this before type of Englishization/Jokery being done before on Rue Crescent, and I always enjoy a good joke.

Yesterday I went to the TEDxMcGill 2010 event. It was really great, well organized, and had great speakers. Like most TED or TEDx events it was inspirational. There were many stories told, philosophies, and ideas shared (which is what TED is about). I will now try to go to any TED or TEDx event I can, and maybe even try to organize some back home if I can. Shout out to Tara for getting me to go to this amazing event! On the way out the organizers surprised the attendees with three TEDxs made out of Diet Coke cans, Coke cans, and water bottles.

Yesterday they were filming a movie outside my building called On the Road. It is a film adaptation of the Novel written by Jack Kerouac. Anyways they setup this fake electrical goods store next to my house and even had old street lamps for a pedestrian scene. It has some big Hollywood names like Kristen Dunst and Kristen Stewart. Check it out in 2011.

A couple of days ago I saw this on Crescent street with my friend. I laughed and had to snap a picture. What I got from it was that someone thought the street name sounds a lot like croissant and thought it would be funny to do this practical joke. It was funny indeed!

Today was one of the craziest sunsets I have seen in person. From a little before Dusk the sky looked really weird, it had a golden tint to it. However I didn’t think it was photo worthy, I knew this shot would never be featured on a stock photos website. However when I saw the Sun setting I had to snap a picture and revive my Photo of the day Segment. Let me tell you the picture does not do the sunset justice, even though it is a nice picture, the sunset was really beautiful! It really inspires me to fire up my camera again, I wish I had it to photograph this picture (shot on my iPhone 4).

I’ve had bad luck in the last couple of years with Umbrellas in Montreal (merde il pleut). The first double canopy umbrella I had was large, and worked great. I lost it at Mister Steer (which has amazing burgers by the way) and was devastated when I came back and it was taken. Next I bought a small umbrella on the go recently because it was raining a lot, only to lose it a couple of days later. Finally I bought one that has a feature that if the umbrella inverts it doesn’t break easily. However it is sort of broken after a really powerful storm rolled through town.

We are now getting more into the raining/snowing season, so I decided I need a new umbrella. After about five minutes of research on the net, I bought the Senz Original which can stand wind forces up to 100kph/70mph which pretty much makes it wind proof. According to the manufacturer it plays with the wind instead of fighting it. One really cool design point is the higher front which allows you to see in front of you. I can attest that’s an important feature to have in an umbrella since others almost always block your eyesight. So you can head on over to the manufacturer’s website to check the umbrella out (I bought mine on eBay) and watch the video of it in front of a wind tunnel below.

Update: I changed my order for the larger Senz XL.

Ps. I still really hate Internet Explorer, the backend of wordpress looks so squareish compared to Chrome, Firefox, and just about every other browser.

Montreal has had the Bixi bike for a little over a year now, and as a member I find it a great way of getting around the city or even just for a joy ride. Today my one year membership comes to an end (until I renew it), and these are the stats that are in my online account. Although recently I have been angered by the availability of the bikes at night, I still love Bixi. Over this year, I have made 297 trips, totaling a cool 47 hours, and traveling 565 kilometers or 351 miles for you imperial folk. The mileage though is approximate, because it does not actually measure how much you bike, but the time spent biking at an average of 5 kilometers per hour, I figure that I bike faster than that though. Finally we have greenhouse emissions, I would have used 142 kilograms of carbon emissions if i was using a car, and 40 liters of gasoline. Overall I really like using the Bixi bikes, and love the online statistics and thought I should share!

Yeah this post is a couple of weeks late, but better late than never. Here are some pictures I snapped while walking around downtown during the Grand Prix Weekend. I’m one of the people that was thrilled to have the Grand Prix return after such a long departure. Montreal really takes shape from this one event, it’s truly great we have it back. My pictures might not have been so great, but I really enjoyed the first picture. The car below is the Roadster Sport, It is manufactured by company called Tesla in California. You might think “So, what?”. The what about this car is that is fully electric and can run around for 244 miles (393 kilometers) on a single charge! They brought it so they can market it, (of course) but the interesting thing is, since we get cheap electricity in Quebec, it only costs about $1.80 to fully charge this car! Enjoy the pictures!

Hey everyone so Toronto’s band Temple of Life, were in a battle of the bands competition at Le National in Montreal, and came in third place. They will be competing in the final sometime in January or February 2010. Check out their set at Le National Below.